


If You Love Something...

by Crunchysunrises



Series: Meant To Be [1]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Aftercare, Community: fic_promptly, Community: hc_bingo, Community: kink_bingo, F/M, Friendship, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-27
Updated: 2013-12-27
Packaged: 2018-01-06 07:29:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1104095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crunchysunrises/pseuds/Crunchysunrises
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Morgan is oblivious to Garcia's feelings and the fact that he is having a full on adult relationship with her, minus the sexual component. Garcia cannot help but want something more - for both of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If You Love Something...

**Author's Note:**

> **Title:** If You Love Something...  
>  **Fandom:** Criminal Minds  
>  **Rating:** PG  
>  **Content Notes:** None  
>  **Disclaimer:** I have no rights to or within the Criminal Minds franchise, copyright, or trademark. This is for fun, not profit.  
>  **Summary:** Derek is oblivious to Garcia's feelings and the fact that he is having a full on adult relationship with her, minus the sexual component. Garcia cannot help but want something more - for both of them.  
>  **Additional Notes:** Written because of something that [](http://oroburos69.dreamwidth.org/profile)[](http://oroburos69.dreamwidth.org/)**oroburos69** said. Also fills the "skeletons in the closet" square of my Hurt/Comfort bingo card, the "subspace/headspace" square of my Kink bingo card, and the "Criminal Minds, Garcia, winding down from a stressful day with a nice complicated lace knitting pattern" prompt on fic_promptly.

Garcia cannot say when it started or even why, but she knows their pattern as well as the ones that she knits. For all that he is reckless in some ways Derek Morgan is a creature of habit in others.

Every day that the team comes into the office, he makes sure to cross their paths. Lunches together are less predictable but they usually eat together at least one a week and two or more in the weeks after a week in which either he or she had been too busy or far away for lunch. He always calls her on the way home from a case, invites her out dancing at least once a month, and twice a month he comes over to Garcia’s apartment for movie night (and ends up sleeping over more often than not). She is expected to be encouraging regarding his house-flipping projects and rental properties, while he is expected to nod and smile when she goes off on some computer-related thing, be it gaming, coding, or fandom.

And once a month, Derek Morgan shows up on her doorstep, sweaty, needy, and reeking of sex. And once a month, Garcia invites him in to use her shower.

While he washes with her soaps and shampoos and brushes his teeth with the toothbrush that resides next to hers, Garcia makes something simple like macaroni and cheese or canned soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. When Derek leaves her bathroom, dressed in the sweatpants that she keeps under the sink expressly for him, Garcia is ready to eat with him. Then they curl up together on her small, overstuffed couch and he watches sports while she knits. If he ends up tucked under one of her (knitted) afghans with his head in her lap more often than not, well, Garcia does not mind. She just focuses on her knitting, her needles click-click-clicking together as patterns take shape between them.

Knitting is like shaping code with her bare hands, except unlike with actual coding, she has a tangible thing at the end of it that she can show off and other people (Derek, the team) can understand, appreciate, and admire.

Eventually, they brush their teeth, Garcia changes into her pajamas, and they go to bed together in her queen-sized bed, which seems so much smaller when Morgan is in it, tucked up behind her with an arm around her waist.

He leaves before Garcia wakes up in the morning.

They never talk about or even mention those visits.

Garcia wonders if Morgan knows that, except for the not having sex with each other part, they are having a full on adult relationship. Given the way that he usually runs and hides when his sex partners want an encore, she suspects not.

But, after extensive research both in print and on the internet, she knows that Derek is having regularly scheduled but wildly kinky sex in addition to his more vanilla pickups and, for whatever reason, has elected Garcia to take care of him when he drops. (While she doesn’t mind taking care of him, Garcia is still trying to work out whether he is the dom or the sub and which would be hotter.)

Garcia enjoys the shape and pattern of her relationship with Morgan but it makes dating harder than it has to be. Unlike Derek, she does not pull sex partners very often and when she does, it takes her a relationship to build up to having sex. It does not help that most guys do not enjoy the idea of dating the girl (who is secretly in love) with the shirtless chocolate Adonis lounging on her couch.

Frankly, Garcia does not blame them. Who wants the remnants of a heart when you can have a whole one instead?

Thanks to her relationship with Morgan (and her inability to get over him or at least inject a little space into it), Garcia ends up with a handful of intrepid boyfriends who do not ultimately work out for one reason (her monogamous heart) or another (their full on romance is time consuming) and an impressive collection of sex toys and unused condoms in the second drawer of her bedside table.

So yeah, by the time that Chicago happens and Derek’s secret comes out, Garcia of all people already knows that Derek Morgan has intimacy issues.

Garcia hates digging through his life because Morgan is someone who values his privacy and she hates what happened to him and she hates that he does not call her on the way back from Chicago.

She hates that he skips their lunches, cancels their movie nights, and that he avoids her religiously. Gone are the morning meetings, the dancing dates, and his habit of randomly dropping into her day, office, _life._ He never sees the printout that she tapes to one of her monitors of him in his college football uniform. Worse, she suspects him of actively avoiding her.

Well, there is no way that Garcia is going to put up with that. If Morgan is going to dump her, he is going to actually have to come out and say, “It’s not you, it really is me. But still, I can’t do this anymore.”

Garcia makes it her business to randomly (but regularly) drop by the B.A.U.’s desks to visit Elle, cheer up Hotch, and be amazed at Reid’s (physics) magic tricks. And she always makes sure to drop by her favorite guy’s desk while she is there. At first, Morgan makes a big show of being super busy when she is around but slowly and surely he begins to relax around her again. He even starts coming over to talk to her when she is visiting someone else.

Morgan starts calling her again on cases, bumping into her at work, and calling her on the jet ride home. He resumes dropping by her office, coming by to drag her out to lunch, and finally starts asking her out dancing again. When she asks him over to watch movies, he accepts enthusiastically.

But the one thing that he never does again is come by for after care.

Garcia worries about that, especially when Morgan starts looking rough and being moody around what Garcia knows to be his monthly kinky sex booty call.

When he calls in sick the day after his regularly scheduled kinky sex night, Garcia takes half a day off of work. She leaves at lunch and goes home to make sure that Morgan is not camped out in her apartment.

He is not.

Tamping down on her irritation, Garcia packs a box of macaroni, half a loaf of white bread, cheese, a can of soup, and her current knitting project. Then she fetches her car from the garage and drives out to Morgan’s current home in the suburbs.

Clooney starts barking before Garcia even makes it all the way up his walkway but it still takes Morgan an agonizingly long time to answer the door.

“You look terrible,” Garcia declares when Morgan finally answers the door because it’s true. She gives his chest a useless little push. “Let me in.”

Morgan takes a few steps back, swings the door wider, and silently invites her in. As soon as she sets foot in the house, Clooney rushes at Garcia for pets, which Garcia gives him gladly.

“Why don’t you go get cleaned up?” Garcia says as she loves on Clooney. “And I’ll make us lunch.”

“Shouldn’t you be at work?” Morgan finally asks.

“I took the afternoon off,” Garcia replies. She makes a flapping gesture at Morgan with her hand. “Go on. You need a shower.”

Morgan snorts but obediently disappears into the master bedroom and the master bathroom beyond it. As soon as he is out of sight, Garcia leaves off of petting Clooney to investigate Morgan’s kitchen. As she suspected, there is not much of anything and what food he has is disgustingly healthy. She makes the soup, grills a pair of sandwiches, and pours two glasses of ice water.

When Morgan emerges from the bathroom dressed in a pair of sweats and a t-shirt, they eat lunch, Garcia carrying most of the conversation.

When Garcia is on her last bite of sandwich, Morgan asks, his expression earnest, “Hey, do you have time to stay and watch a little football with me?”

“For you, I have all the time in the world, my lovely,” Garcia cheerfully replies and is promptly rewarded with a wide grin.

So they settle into their usual routine, him watching sports and her click-click-clicking with her knitting needles. With satisfaction, Garcia watches the pattern take shape.

Even though Morgan’s long, leather couch is big enough for both of them he still ends up with his head in her lap and one hand curved over her knee. After months without, Garcia thinks that this is a perfectly wonderful way to spend a Thursday afternoon.

Unfortunately, Garcia has never been one to let things go.

“Morgan, I don’t mind that you come to my place after your regularly scheduled kinky sexcapades,” she says and feels Morgan’s hand tighten on her knee. The side of his face, which she can see just beyond her knitting, is surprisingly inexpressive. “In fact, I worry when you don’t.”

“How do you know about that?” he asks without looking away from a replay. It has red circles and scribbles all over it.

“I know things,” Garcia says breezily. Derek flinches. “It’s not a big deal. Everyone decompresses in their own way. I knit or drink Red Bull and pull all nighters with barbarian hordes out of India. Elle goes to the shooting range or picks up guys in bars. And you have a monthly kinky sex hookup.”

“I _used_ to have a monthly hookup,” Morgan corrects and sits up. “I don’t anymore.”

“Not since Chicago,” Garcia agrees, refusing to even try to unpack the timing behind Morgan’s decision.

Scowling, Morgan snaps, “I don’t want to talk about Chicago.”

“And that’s fine!” Garcia rushes to tell him. “But if you ever _did_ want to talk about that or – or anything else, we could. Talk, that is.”

“What would you say?” Morgan demands sharply, his voice rising.

“That you should’ve told me that you’d played football in college!” Garcia immediately replies and Derek smiles. “And that I was sorry for going through your secret records.”

“Oh, no, don’t,” Derek rushes to say. “You were trying to help me, mama.”

“I was,” Penelope assures him “but it was still an awful thing to do. And I should probably take down that picture of you in my office. Fruit of the poisonous tree and all that.”

“You’ve got a picture of me up?” Derek asks and smiles again.

“Taped to one of my monitors,” Garcia admits and his smile widens. Morgan knows how seriously she takes her electronic babies. “It’s a black and white newspaper printout of you in your college uniform, senior year. That one was the one that looked the most like you.”

Morgan laughs, a sharp burst of mirth, and slings an arm around Garcia in a half-hug. When he pulls her toward himself, Garcia willingly snuggles into his side. He goes back to watching the television and she returns her attention to her knitting.

Well, most of her attention.

“Hey, if you want, you’re still welcome at my place on kinky sex night,” Garcia offers.

“And what would we do together on kinky sex night?” he asks, his tone deepening. It is enough to make Garcia quiver with lust.

“Anything you want,” Garcia replies breathlessly, her heart in her throat.

“Will you knit?” Morgan asks hopefully.

“If you want,” Garcia replies. Cursing herself for a coward, she adds, “And we could eat pizza and play twister.”

Morgan’s happy smile makes Garcia’s chest ache.

But she is hardly surprised when kinky sex night becomes game night. Anything else is impossible with Morgan, not if she wants to keep him around. Garcia enjoys their time together and she loves Morgan but she cannot help but wish for more for them both.


End file.
